The Gridiron Club of Greater Boston has announced that 38 players are semifinalists for the 23rd Joe Concannon Award, presented annually to the best American-born NCAA Division II/III hockey player in New England.
The award was established in 2001 shortly after the passing of the longtime writer for the Boston Globe who had a great passion for the game of college hockey while always advocating strongly for amateur athletics.
“This year has seen an incredibly competitive landscape at the DII/III level,” said Gridiron Club hockey awards committee chairman Tim Costello in a news release. “A watch list of over 80 outstanding players showcased a large number of outstanding players throughout the season to date, which has made this year’s group of nominees the most balanced the committee has seen in the history of the award. The 38 semifinalists represent our largest field in the 23-year history of the Concannon Award, and it was a great challenge to reduce the list to that number. We always expect to see the strongest contenders for the award emerge over the final weeks of the regular season, conference championship tournaments and the NCAA title chase in March.
“The committee will be watching closely to see which players rise to the top for this year’s Concannon.”
The 2023 winner was Plymouth State forward Myles Abbate.
Twenty-five schools are represented in the slate of candidates that includes five players from the NEHC, five from the NE-10, seven from the MASCAC, nine from the NESCAC and 10 from the CCC. Two independent programs, Anna Maria and Albertus Magnus, also have nominees this season.
The list of nominees includes 27 forwards, six defensemen and five goaltenders.
Assumption, Curry Endicott, and Trinity have three nominees each while UMass Dartmouth, Plymouth State, Salem State, Salve Regina, and Tufts, each have two nominees.
Albertus Magnus: Tim Manning, junior forward
Amherst: Ryan Tucker, senior forward
Anna Maria: Cam Tobey, graduate student defenseman
Assumption: Ronny Paragallo, junior forward, John Woernle, freshman defenseman, Shane Sullivan, graduate student forward
Babson: Ryan Murphy, sophomore forward
Bowdoin: Luke Wheeler, junior forward
Colby: Jack Sullivan, senior defenseman
Connecticut College: Sean Dynan, senior goaltender
Curry: Gage Dill, sophomore forward, Shane Soderwall, freshman goaltender, Tao Ishizuka, senior forward
Endicott: Andrew Kurapov, senior forward, Jackson Sterrett, senior forward, Kevin Craig, senior defenseman
Johnson and Wales: Brendan Doyle, sophomore forward
UMass Dartmouth: Jake Maynard, senior defenseman, Collin Patterson, freshman forward
Norwich: Clark Kerner, junior forward
Plymouth State: Connor Tait, junior forward, Will Pray, freshman forward
Salem State: Erik Larsson, senior forward, Zach Dill, sophomore forward
Salve Regina: Johnny Mulera, senior forward, Matthew Fawcett, junior forward
Southern Maine: Austin Marini, senior forward
St. Anselm: Hunter Brackett, junior forward
St. Michael’s: Brennan McFarland, junior forward
Suffolk: Devin Lowe, graduate student forward
Trinity: Ned Blanchard, senior defenseman, Devon Bobak, sophomore goaltender, Christian Hayes, senior forward
Tufts: Tyler Sedlak, junior forward, Peyton Durand, senior goaltender
University of New England: Billy Girard IV, junior goaltender
VSU-Castleton: Andrew Stefura, junior forward
Westfield State: Gianluca Marini, senior forward
The Gridiron Club will announce the finalists and winner of the award in March, following league playoffs and before the start of NCAA Frozen Four on March 22 and March 24 on the campus of Trinity College in Hartford, Conn.
